Ginny Gilder is a self-described challenge seeker. As a young woman, she set her sights on a goal that most told her was impossible — to become an Olympic medalist in rowing.

Bob Ryan calls it how he sees it. Hold the sugar. Give an audience the truth and nothing but the truth, plain and simple. At the end of the day, the voice of Boston sports wanted it no other way.

After a year away, Billy Collins returned to the Featherstone Center for the Arts on Tuesday evening to a hero’s welcome.

Junot Diaz burst onto the literary scene in 1996 with the publication of Drown. In 2007 he won the Pulitzer Prize for his second book, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. And on Thursday, July 30, he will read at the Noepe Center for Literary Arts in Edgartown.

The Hebrew Center was filled with lyrical verse and open ears Monday evening for a poetry reading celebrating author Peggy Freydberg, who died this spring at 107. Speakers included actresses Mary Steenburgen, Meg Ryan, and Brooke Adams and poet Billy Collins.

This year’s Martha’s Vineyard Book Festival takes place August 1 through August 2 and features a mix of fiction and nonfiction authors, including former congressmen and chefs and best-selling authors.